Challenging Conceptions

Kimberly Theidon, PhD, Henry J. Leir Professor in International Humanitarian Studies, Co-Director, Gender and Intersectional Analysis and Women's/Femmes' Leadership Program, the Fletcher School of Global Affairs, Tufts UniversityDyan Mazurana, PhD, Research Professor, Co-Director of Gender and Intersectional Analysis and Women's/Femmes' Leadership Program, Fletcher School of Global Affairs; Research Professor, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy; Research Fellow, World Peace Foundation; Research Director, Feinstein International Center, Tufts UniversityFriedman School of Nutrition Science and PolicyDipali Anumol is a doctoral candidate at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where she earned her Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy in 2019.

Tens of thousands of children worldwide have been born as a result of mass rape campaigns or wartime sexual exploitation. What about these living legacies of rape and sexual violence? What do we know about these children and their life chances? To explore these and other questions, Challenging Conceptions gathers together an interdisciplinary and international roster of scholars. They include professors and doctoral students in the fields of anthropology, gender studies, history, law, transitional justice, social work, and sociology among others. Some of these practitioners and scholars, as they explain in their chapters, are also themselves women who gave birth to children born of wartime sexual violence. The exchange of their voices and perspectives shines through in this collection to produce new and cutting-edge knowledge on children born of war time sexual violence.

Ch.1 Challenging Conceptions